Marian and Peter Addyman were informed by their bank NatWest that their £226,000-mortgage ($380,211) had been withdrawn. Adding to the Addyman´s shock: the mortgage had been renegotiated only six months earlier and they had never missed a payment.

NatWest refused to give an explanation. The Addymans had 30 days to find a new deal or...

The young couple played by the rules and lost. Why?

A real estate bubble burst. The Addyman´s house was suddenly "underwater," worth less than their mortgage. That means that if NatWest repossessed the house, NatWest would instantly lose money. Why, then, did NatWest want the house? Doesn´t make sense...

Or does it?

Like a little kid, NatWest is playing with bubbles.

It sells the Addymans of this world their house when the market is high. Most likely, a real estate bubble is in place, swelling. Urgent! Buy NOW!! Sign here...The bubble then does what all bubbles do: burst. The bank repossesses -- at gun point and police squad if necessary -- the house at its new, reduced value with the expectation of selling it later to another unsuspecting buyer when the bubble reappears and home values rise. Urgent! Buy NOW!! Sign here...Get lost comes later, when the boom is busted.

Banks can make money off a rising and falling market because they can afford to wait -- unlike the Addymans who got stuck with a mind-wobbling debt and the specter of bankruptcy. The secret is in the timing: NatWest gets its customers to buy when they should be selling, and vice-versa. Peter and Marian were had coming and going. Clever, no? Welcome to house flipping, banker-style.

Marian Addyman: "Banks shouldn´t be allowed to treat people like this." We agree 200%. It´s Reality Therapy Time: (i) If Ross McEwan, CEO of Royal Bank of Scotland that owns NatWest, ever goes on TV to counter the rising tide of discontent, he will give the following explanation: Gosh, as everybody knows, we got to make a profit. In order to do that, we have to play by the rules. Well, in our business, those rules are dictated by business cycles. We either go along or go under. Ross, I have heard your spiel a thousand times. You say you want to start a "cultural revolution" in your organization. How about starting at the top, with you standing tall, telling the truth about and taking responsibility for what you are did to the Addyman family? For the first time in history, a banker would stop behaving like a little kid. Ross, you shrug and say you have no power over business cycles. I hate to tell you something, but obviously somebody has to: There´s no such thing as an innocent bystander. (ii) Peter and Marian, you can pass all the anti-banker laws, local ordinances and other "reforms" you like; as long as there are real estate bubbles, the bankers´ game will go on and on. The reason is easy to find. He who controls the rules of the game wins the game -- and the controller isn´t you or me. In this case, controlling the rules means controlling the bubbles, blowing them, popping them. An upcoming post to this blog will use Cuenca, Ecuador as a case study of how megabucks insiders create housing market booms.(iii) Do you want to know in precise, physical, mathematical terms what the family trauma and financial ruin of hard-working people like you mean to bankers and speculators? -459.67F. Absolute zero. Maybe even lower. After all, your loss is their gain.

What we can tell you, Peter and Marian, is this: you are not alone. In 2007-2011 in the United States 10 million people were evicted from over four million homes. As you learned the hard way, we are in a new era -- that of legal crimes.The crisis is not merely one of individual families like the Addyman´s; it is the crisis of the middle class in general. We noted in our post "The Chaos Whisperer. Part 5: The Cure For House Flipping" (November 30, 2012):

"It is not easy to get a handle on the damage which the post-2006 housing crisis inflicted on the middle class as distinguished from the other two classes. However, a highly probative clue is found in net worth (total assets minus deficits). The Pew Research Center concluded in August 2012 in an aptly-titled study, The Lost Decade of The Middle Class: ´Net worth of middle-income families dropped 39% ... [from $129,582 in 2001 to $93,150 in 2010] as the housing market crash and Great Recession wiped out the previous advances. Over the 1983 to 2010 period, only upper-income families registered strong increases in wealth.´"

No, you aren´t seeing things. The American middle class is 39% poorer. Only one thing can cause a financial earthquake of that magnitude: homes and other property were lost, repossessed.

If there were a way to control rampant real estate speculation, there would be fewer and smaller bubbles. That means bankers like Ross McEwan would have fewer and smaller bubble games to play. Fewer families like the Addymans would be cheated out of their homes, end up debt-choked, bankrupted. And that means fewer lives, particularly those of women and children, would be destroyed.

We are not saying that getting rid of house flipping will stop all bubbles. For that matter, tulip and dotcom booms and busts showed that speculative bubbles are not confined to the housing market. We are saying that real estate bubbles will always be with us until house flipping is a thing of the past. To sum up: severely curtailing, if not stopping, house flipping is the necessary (but not sufficient) condition to make Marian´s wish come true. Banks shouldn´t be allowed to treat people like this.Bankers, I must add, aren´t the only speculators who are out of control.

* * *

We are going to present a cure for house flipping. Let´s look first, though, at an alternative that is making the rounds.

It appears that President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is going to present an amendment to his nation´s Constitution. Last month, he floated an idea for controlling land speculation. El Tiempo:

"´I buy a lot for $1,000, then sit back and three years later I sell it for $5,000. Why so much? What value-added has been created? Pure and simple speculation. Why should we not consider a constitutional amendment to abolish capital gains on land?´ President Correa said."*To my knowledge, no other president past of present ever expressed the concern and solution President Correa voiced. We congratulate him for his awareness and sensitivity to the growing speculation menace to his country and Latin America; we will address it in our forthcoming post. We also salute him for his courage to break taboos -- he mentioned the unmentionable -- and for his willingness to try something new. (For a contrast, look no further than Barack Obama. One of his golfing buddies -- as our upcoming post will show -- is a prime suspect in real estate speculation on a colossal international scale.)

If-- and it is a big "if" -- President Correa´s constitutional amendment takes the form noted above, I fear it will not work. Here´s why.

Let´s say I bought a vacant lot for $100,000 in 1995. The amendment banning capital gains on land becomes the law of the land, and I want to sell the lot. Question: what will be my asking price?

Well, not really. Here´s what will I suspect will happen in practice under a zero capital gains system:

I offer to sell my vacant lot for $100,000. 10 people want to buy it. Question: How will I decide who will be the eventual buyer?

That is what´s called a dilemma. One of the prospective buyers sees a way out: he offers me $10,000 on the side. There is no law I can find anywhere that prevents somebody from giving money as a gift. (If you don´t believe it, offer your neighbor $10. Go ahead -- see if he takes it.) If asked, the buyer can say the $10,000 had nothing to do with the vacant lot, oh no -- perish the thought. He gave me the $10,000 because he likes me. Case closed; over and out; have a good day. No law has been broken by either of us.

Of course, what I might do is talk to the other nine wannabe buyers. "One of your rivals just offered me $10,000 as a Christmas gift," I jokingly tell each one separately: "Hear any jingle bells?" After the requisite nodding and winking, a bidding war takes place. And so, the same old evil market is re-established in the back alley, off the books.

Let it not be said, however, that the abolition of capital gains on land would do nothing new. Municipalities and other public bodies would be deprived of revenues from taxes on those gains. After all, you cannot tax something that does not exist. No capital gains = no taxes on capital gains. And we know there are no capital gains because...the Constitution tells us so.

If land is the sole target of zero capital gains, the seller of a house will simply factor into the price of his house the lack of capital gains on the land on which the house sits. What is subtracted with one hand is added with the other. Net effect of the Constitutional amendment on the house price: 0.

Again, I empathize completely with President Correa´s concern. However, legally abolishing capital gains on land will not suppress real estate speculation. House flippers and other speculators in and around Ecuador are perfectly aware of that fact, which is why for the moment they are staying moon rock-silent. Same old ga-game without the taxes...perrrrfect! Because the amendment´s appearance and reality are in contradiction, the speculators believe it was made to order for them. Was it? Correa´s enemies are primed and ready to pounce. Call it what you will, it still remains the same. Oligarchs, bankers, house flippers and other speculators throughout the Western Hemisphere can sleep peacefully in their palaces. * * *

Regular readers of this blog know that house flipping -- arguably the most destructive form of real estate speculation ever invented -- is a long-standing concern. See our five-part series "The Chaos Whisperer" of October-November 2012, and "Carta Abierta a América Latina. La Solución de los Tigres al Caos Emergente" of May 30, 2013.

Below is an updated version of our solution. It is in Spanish for reasons to be explained shortly. Its basic principles and practices are available in English in our "Chaos Whisperer" series just mentioned. Two important additions:(i) We propose a specific tax schedule on house flipping.

1. One year or less separating purchase and sale of a property: 90% of capital gains.

2. Between 1 year and 2 years: 75%.

3. Between 2 and 3 years: 50%.

4. Between 3 and 4 years: 25%.

5. 4 years or more: 0%.(ii) After completing the Chaos Whisperer series I discovered that Taipei (the capital of Taiwan), Singapore and South Korea have a tax on house flipping. They are three of the four "Asian Tigers" renowned for their rapid economic development. At bottom, the Asians are discouraging at home what they practice abroad. They learned something.

Tragically, the same cannot be said for Americans. For them, house flipping has become a national pastime. There is a myriad of how-to books, videos, articles, seminars, conferences and workshops on the subject. To my knowledge, not a single city, county or state has a specific tax on house flipping; not a single public official has dared stand up to the latest craze and to mention the connection between house flipping and the fall of the middle class. Those facts of life are to be expected. The appalling lack of knowledge characterizing government and public office holders from city to federal levels also characterizes the American public. It can truthfully be said, then, that the former are simply doing what they are supposed to do: represent the views of the latter. In practical terms, there is something else: to swim against the house-flipping tsunami would be political suicide.The upshot: any genuine effort to control house flipping must take place outside the United States. Asia, as noted, is already doing it. I have chosen to focus on Latin America where flipping is less entrenched (note: that situation is rapidly changing.)

Back to the United States: Today, house flipping is a sport practiced with a passion far greater than any football game can muster: Tell your neighbors you know a widow who has to sell her house fast to put hamburgers on the table, then step back. Hot damn! Gimme her phone number! Sweet Jesus! NOW!! It´s not so much what they say, but the way they say it. The tightened jaw, the fast and furious blinking, the glazed eyes, the kindly Santa Claus smile: all have been seen before, thousands of times, in the faces of Spanish conquistadores who swarmed over Latin America searching for El Dorado, the legendary city of gold. From Mexico and Guatemala to Chile and Argentina, the Old World freebooters and buccaneers were into gold as hard metal, not house flipping. The latter phenomenon had to wait more than four hundred years and the invasion of new conquistadores armed not with swords and horses but lawyers and accountants. The ancient legend took on a new language, and literally got a new lease on life: El Dorado Gringo. Cómo Contrarrestar La Especulación en Bienes Inmobiliarios

3. http://vietmaz.com/2013/03/tax-tools-restrict-real-estate-speculation/#.UUtZLmfnbRQ 4. “… several foreign countries impose taxes on profits from real estate sales following sales frequency in order to prevent real estate speculation and bubbles. For example, Singapore taxes 100 percent of the gap between the buying and selling value in the first year of transaction; 50 percent in the second year and 25 percent in the third year. The Republic of Korea also applies similar tax rates including 50 percent of profits from real estate sales within the first year and 40 percent after the first year to the second year (for registered real estate) or 70 percent (for non-registered real estate). ..

You are about to look in the face America´s secret, inner essence -- its ἁμαρτία (hamartia).

The word is at least 2,000 years old; Aristotle used it as an analytical tool in his discussion of Greek tragedies.** As is always the case with expressions rooted in the unconscious, the exact meaning of hamartia is unclear. It has been translated as fatal flaw, tragic error, error in judgment, ignorance, mistake, sin, evil deed, offense, accidental wrongdoing, trespass, frailty, miscalculation, vice, moral error. Most scholars agree, however, the basic meaning of hamartia is missing the mark. (For more on the subject, see our post of February 28, 2014, "The ´Hamartia´ of Rafael Correa.")Happy Independence Day!We say it genuinely, but in a way you never saw before -- and most likely will never see again. * * * "I think that nations, like men, almost always show, from a very young age, the traits of their destiny." -- Alexis de Tocqueville*** --

While working out in Earls Court Gym in London, three jihadists surrounded me. I will never forget how their eyes blazed. Determined to get my goat, they engaged me in a discussion about whether or not the United States military is the most powerful in the world. They asked/answered, Did not Vietnam win its war for independence and unification against the USA?

The population of Vietnam in 1975, when it won the war, was 50 million. Iran today has 77 million. If the United States invaded Iran, the jihadists asked, would Iran win?

"Wouldn´t surprise me," I said: "The United States has never won a war."

If your jaw dropped to the floor, dear reader, you are not alone. You should have seen the jihadists.

"Except one," I added.

How could anybody dare say such a thing? Contemptible, preposterous.

I assure you my position engages in no fancy, lawyer-istic finagling about the definition of war. (I wish the same could be said for my opponents.) A definition of war is vital, but will not be addressed here. Sidebar: for readers who seek to define war, the starting place is Carl von Clausewitz´s classic, On War, Chapter 1. He defined war in composite terms: it is "an act of violence to compel our opponent to fulfill our will," notably ﻿"to disarm;"﻿ war is "never an isolated act" or "a single instantaneous blow;" the result of war is "never an absolute;" war is "no pastime...no mere passion for venturing and winning; it is a serious means for a serious object;" finally, war is a "political instrument" with a "political object."

Scholars will tell you that certain aspects of Clausewitz´s work, first published in 1832, are dated. Be that as it may, other aspects are still very much alive. On every page, Clausewitz will make you think.

O.K., Americans, West Point, Annapolis and Air Force Academy professors, students, alumni: What was the one and only war the United States of America won? And what´s the story with all those other wars it did not win?

1. The American Revolution. I bet that was your first best guess. Simple, no? On October 19, 1781, British General Charles Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown. The Treaty of Paris of September 30, 1783, formally ended the war. The American colonies won independence from England.

The country of the United States of America did not win the revolutionary war.

The reason is that country did not exist.

Countries definitely existed at the time; the Peace of Westphalia, which formally instituted the nation-state system, was concluded in 1648. However, the United States of America was not among them.

The Declaration of Independence of July 4, 1776, was proclaimed by the "thirteen united [sic] States of America." What explains the small "u": the 13 colonies fighting for independence saw themselves as 13 separate nation-states. In fact, they were recognized as such by The Treaty of Paris:

"His Brittanic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz., New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be free sovereign and independent states..."

That recognition simply recognized the obvious. The American colonists had no notion of themselves as one country when they adopted the Articles of Confederation on March 1, 1781, seven months before Cornwallis surrendered:

"The Stile of this Confederacy shall be

´The United States of America´.

II. Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.

III. The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship..."

A confederacy is not a country. A league of friendship is not a country. A union, such as the European Union, is not a country.

The country of the United States of America was born on March 4, 1789, when the government created by the United States Constitution began operating.

2. The War of 1812 officially started on June 12, 1812, when the United States Congress declared war on the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The Treaty of Ghent formally ended the conflict on December 24, 1814.

To hear songster Johnny Horton tell it ("The Battle of New Orleans"), 23-year-old America literally beat the British going away:

We fired our guns and the British kept a'comin. There wasn't nigh as many as there was a while ago. We fired once more and they began to runnin' on Down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico.

Lily-livered, crumpet-munching tea-sippers... Sorry, Horton fans: It´s Reality Therapy Time. The battle of New Orleans was exactly that -- a battle.The more you read about the War of 1812, the more you scratch your head. Who won? Anybody? Who lost? A classic draw, if there ever was one. Canadian author Pierre Berton: "It was as if no war had been fought, or to put it more bluntly, as if the war that was fought was fought for no good reason. For nothing has changed; everything is as it was in the beginning..."Well, almost nothing changed. Besides Johnny Horton, the War of 1812 inspired poet-lawyer Francis Scott Key to pen "The Star-Spangled Banner." There you have it.Wait a second... There is something else. The war spawned an endless, crabby debate among history professors about whether or not during the conflict Canada actually won a war against U.S. invaders. If you want to know more, ask any Canadian -- the victory is part of their national identify. As for Americans, I never met one who even heard of the incident.A draw with the British? Beaten by Canada? It´s enough to make any self-respecting American fighting man choke on his Gatorade and bourbon. But wait -- there´s more.

3. The American Indian Wars began in 1622 with the Jamestown Massacre and ended in 1890 with the Wounded Knee Massacre. The Indians lost. Or did they?

Indian Wars or a single 268-year war fought on different fronts? I don´t want to start a semantic squabble. Let´s just say that when you go to the barber you get a haircut -- not a hairs-cut. Indian Wars is a collective noun that is denied recognition as such. Underneath that refusal is the same old story: divide et impera.

Denied by whom? Definitely not the Indians. One of my high school buddies was a Seminole. An industrial-strength denizen of Huey´s pool hall on lower Main Street, James was a fantastic snooker player. He made a living hustling hustlers; Paul Newman would have had his head handed to him in a basket. As for us commoners, James would mumble an admonition from "The Cincinnati Kid" starring Steve McQueen: lessons cost extra.

When an out-of-towner casually and casuistically informed him that whites always had and always will beat Indians, I feared James was going to compel the unsuspecting prey to eat his pool cue plus chalk for lunch. Here´s why:

The first thing the Seminoles tell you on their official web site is they are the only tribe that never signed a peace treaty with the federal government. That means the Indian Wars, and I do mean all of them, have not been concluded.

Until a treaty with the Seminoles is signed, I hate to tell you, Washington, but you have been snookered.

P.S. Whatever you do, dear reader, do not hold your breath waiting for the Seminoles to sign a peace treaty.O.K., all you bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, throbbing at the bone American patriots: is your temperature rising? Jukebox blowing a fuse? But wait -- there´s more.4. The Spanish-American War. Ah ha, you muse -- here is the war America won. Did not the Spanish Empire crash and burn under American military might? Did not Spain relinquish sovereignty over Cuba and have to sell Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines to America for a low/lower/lowest $20 million?

The war officially began on April 25, 1898, when Congress declared it, and ended on August 12, 1898, with the signing of the Spain-United States Protocol of Peace. Go figure: three months, two weeks and four days. Now you know why Theodore Roosevelt called it the ﻿"splendid little war." I believe Clausewitz would detect an oxymoron: to the extent the Spanish-American War was a pastime for venturing and winning, what took place was not a war. We will not make that argument here,**** however; no need to.

The United States did not win the Spanish-American War. To explain why, I need to interject a bit of something West Point, Annapolis and the Air Force Academy don´t teach: common sense.

On February 11, 1990, James "Buster" Douglas pulled off what is arguably the greatest sporting upset of all times. He defeated Mike Tyson for the undisputed heavyweight boxing crown. Nobody gave Douglas a chance; you couldn´t bet on him because no odds were offered. You can watch Douglas knock out Tyson here.

Now, let´s say that with the referee´s permission, just before Tyson hit the canvas you jumped in the ring and punched him. Question: could you rightfully claim you won the fight?

At this point, what is called in Spanish a perogrullada appears -- an answer so obvious as to be stupid. Rather, should be obvious. The reason why so many Americans don´t see it -- make that, can´t see it -- is discussed below. For them, I will commit a perogrullada and spell out the answer to our Tyson knockout question:

No, you did not win the fight. At best, you could brag to your buddies over beer and knockworst sandwiches that you helped beat Tyson.

What does Douglas v. Tyson have to do with the Spanish American War? Answer: everything. Roosevelt´s splendid little war was actually the culmination of three wars for Cuban independence: the Ten Years´ War (1868-1878), the Little War (1879-1880) and the War of Independence (1895-1898).

Scholars often group the three wars together to form The Great 30 Year War. To belittle or marginalize it -- to see only the three-month American-Spanish combat -- is to fudge the definition of war.

30 years versus three months. Now you know why the Spanish-American War is not the war the United States won. If you have problems with that conclusion, watch the entire Douglas/Tyson fight here. The apparently effortless knockout you witnessed above came after nine rounds of incredibly grueling punishment dished out by both fighters. Any closing-second punch you might have thrown would be literally beside the point.

In 1898, did one of Tocqueville´s traits encapsulating an entire nation´s destiny emerge? A fatal flaw?

5. World War I. If every high school history teacher I ever had was right, we have arrived at the war America won.

Last week, on June 28, international commemorations took place. Exactly 100 years ago, World War I started with the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Duchess Sophie. The war ended exactly five years later with the Treaty of Versailles.

The United States Congress declared war on the German Empire on April 6, 1917. World War I lasted 1914-1919. Our conclusion is undeniable: the war was 60% over when America entered it.

There are many ways other than time, however, to measure a nation´s contribution to a war effort. Among them is the number of troops mobilized. The United States total for World War I was 4 million-plus. That figure must be compared to those of other Allies: 12 million for Russia, 9 million for the British Empire, 8 million for France and 6 million for Italy.

Total troop casualties (killed, wounded, missing/prisoners) tell the same story. The number for the United States was 323,000, versus 9 million for Russia, 3 million for the British Empire, 6 million for France, 2 million for Italy.

Conclusion? To avoid a second perogrullada, I won´t pronounce it.

Of course every soldier and every casualty counts. That is why to claim "the United States won World War I" is pretentiousness bordering on blasphemy. It relegates the contributions and sacrifices of all other Allies to -459.67F: absolute zero.

The United States did not win World War I. The Allies won World War I. As a member of the Allies, the United States helped win World War I.

6. World War II. It is generally agreed in the West that the war began on September 1, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. It ended on September 2, 1945, when the Japanese surrendered aboard the USS Missouri.

Did the Tocquevillian trait reappear? As in the Spanish-American War and World War I, did the United States pile on late? Deliver a 10th-round punch?

Due to an extenuating circumstance, Washington had no choice but to enter World War II. The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Days later, America declared war on Japan and Germany. I have often wondered not if but when and how the United States would have entered World War II had the Japanese not bombed Pearl Harbor. The question is apropos. Japanese war hero Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, who carried out the Pearl Harbor attack, rigorously opposed his mission. If Emperor Hirohito had listened to Yamamoto...

Discounting our WW II entry issue and given the 1939-1945 time frame, an American pile-on did not occur.

What about military deaths? Among the Allies, the Soviet Union had 10 million, followed by China with three and a half million and Yugoslavia with 450,000. The United States held 4th place with 417,000. A point to consider: more Americans died in World War II than in World War I.

Finally, in terms of mobilized personnel, among the Allies the USSR held first place with 29 million, followed by the United States with 16 million.At the end of the day, what you find is another group victory for the Allies, so our conclusion regarding World War I applies to World War II. The United States did not win World War II. The Allies won World War II. America was a member of the Allies; America helped win World War II.

"The United States won World War II." The reason for such throbbing juvenile hubris so often voiced in America is, I believe, cultural/ideological:

Somewhere in the 50 states this very second at least 10 somebodies are singing or playing "My Way." Americans can´t get enough of it. Musicians either; it is arguably the most covered song in history. I think the reason for its astounding success is its inner polarity, hence tension. "My Way" is great mythology, lousy reality. Nobody does it my way -- certainly not Frank Sinatra or Elvis Presley who recorded it. In their careers they had plenty of help from other people. Ditto Paul Anka who wrote the lyrics for "My Way" but not the music, which is French. I can´t imagine a song without music. Talk about help.****Is the ego inflation paraded in "My Way" another manifestation of America´s hamartia -- its frailty, moral error, ignorance -- in the form of overcompensation?

7. The Korean War, 1950-1953. I never heard anybody say the United States won that war. The visible, geographic stalemate continues to this day. Let´s move on.

Did you figure out the one and only war the United States won? No? Stumped?

History books will tell you the precipitating cause of the conflict was the United States annexation of Texas (1845), which Mexico considered to be part of its territory. Well...yes and no. The real cause was simply that the United States was determined to expand to the Pacific Ocean. The acquisition of Texas was part of the plan.

The Mexican land which the U.S. coveted was isolated from Mexico City and sparsely populated. At the time, Mexico was economically impoverished and politically in turmoil. U.S. President James Polk saw an opportunity, and seized it.

Its army defeated, its capitol and major cities occupied, Mexico had no choice but to sign the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. It reduced Mexico´s territory by 50%. In the process, the United States expanded by an area the size of Europe for which it paid Mexico $15 million -- about $420 million today.

What land, exactly, did the U.S. win? Visualize all or part of 10 states: California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Texas, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Oklahoma, and New Mexico.

When all is said and done -- and it was -- the United States achieved its goal: an unabashed, unabridged land grab. We are looking at a textbook example of a political goal a la Clausewitz. Conclusion? The USA won the war.

I swear I just heard somebody in the Pentagon or CIA headquarters shout Hooray! I will not join them. Remember Clausewitz´s observation that the result of war is never an absolute...

In the Mexican-American War, the United States won the crown. However, some jewels were missing. As told by the wife of Nicholas Trist, the main U.S. negotiator for the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo:

"Just as they were about to sign the treaty...one of the Mexicans, Don Bernardo Couto, remarked to him, ´this must be a proud moment for you; no less proud for you than it is humiliating for us.´ To this Mr. Trist replied ´we are making peace, let that be our only thought.´ But, said he to us in relating it, ´Could those Mexicans have seen into my heart at that moment, they would have known that my feeling of shame as an American was far stronger than theirs could be as Mexicans. For though it would not have done for me to say so there, that was a thing for every right minded American to be ashamed of, and I was ashamed of it, most cordially and intensely ashamed of it.´"

So much for honest consciousness. One translation of hamartia is trespass. The amazing thing Trist revealed is that, even in its one and only win, America´s tragic flaw or hamartia was present. Rather than a history treatise, an idomatic expression comes to mind: can´t win for losing. Trespass. I believe Manifest Destiny just took on a new meaning.I repeat: the United States won The Mexican-American War. Our conundrum is solved.

For you optimists out there, the American war bottle is nowhere near half full. One win in 11 (see below) wars is, to say the least, unimpressive. Why, then, does the U.S. keep trying? An answer will be given shortly.

Our conundrum pertains to the rest of the bottle -- the bigger, empty part.

America helped finish many wars. It confuses -- unconsciously so -- finishing with winning. On that point, the entire country is in a state of denial, consequently, of fudging. Which is why you have never seen, and likely never will see, our viewpoint expressed anywhere else.

When something is unconsciously repressed, it resurfaces again and again in ever more puerile, violent forms. Repression explains why the Tocquevillian trait that appeared so early -- the U.S. was only 109 years old when the Spanish-American War occurred -- is starting to show up more frequently and virulently.

1. The Vietnam War, a.k.a. the Second Indochina War or, as it is known in Vietnam, the Resistance War Against America. American media will coolly inform you the war was between Vietnam and the United States, and that it lasted 1959-1975. What that account leaves out is the rest of the story. U.S. participation historically was a continuation of the French-Vietnamese War, the First Indochina War, 1946-1954. You think round one was no big deal? If your conclusion is yes and you voice it to a Frenchman, don´t forget to duck. In terms of casualties, 89,797 French forces were killed/missing in Vietnam. The figure was 58,286 for the United States.

2. There were two U.S. wars with Iraq: (1) The Gulf War or Operation Desert Storm, 1990-1991, and (2) the Iraq War proper that began with the United States Invasion on March 20, 2003. Tentatively, the Iraq War ended on December 15, 2011, with the pullout of American troops. Tentatively, because in the past week the U.S. has sent hundreds of soldiers back to Iraq to counter the growing Isis threat. We may be facing a close encounter of the fourth kind; stay tuned...

As with the Vietnam War, the U.S. intervention in Iraq should never be torn from its historical context. It occurred on the heels of the Iran-Iraq War, 1980-1988 -- arguably the longest conventional war of the twentieth century. The outcome was a stalemate. After a million casualties, both countries were spent, exhausted. As in Vietnam, America´s hamartia manifested itself in the form of a serious miscalculation. Sending in American troops was supposed to be quick and easy -- a mopping-up operation of a wearied and wasted enemy. "Mission Accomplished"? "Major combat missions in Iraq have ended"? (President George W. Bush) No comment here; no third perogrullada.

3. The War in Afghanistan, 2001 to present. The war came shortly after 9/11 when the Taliban Government refused to hand over bin Laden to the U.S.

Here, too, the Tocquevillian trait -- the closing-second Mike Tyson punch, the piling-on -- is evidenced. The American war in Afghanistan followed the Soviet War in Afghanistan that dragged on for ten years -- from the Soviet invasion on December 24, 1979, to the final troop withdrawal on February 15, 1989.

All of the above leads us here:

Draws, incompletes, unacknowledged help, one tarnished win, one indisputable loss (two if the Canadians are right)... When a purported solution -- in this case, war -- fails but is attempted over and over again anyway, the unconscious is in control. In the affairs of nations, the cause is the consequence: unwise. Missing the mark.

Our conundrum: What is in the American character that causes it to enter late -- that prevents it from winning, i.e., starting and ending, a war?

If character is destiny, a question arises: what is character? If character cannot exist independently of hamartia or fatal flaw/ignorance/miscalculation, what is America´s hamartia?

The answer consists of one word. I will be more than happy to give it when a consensus develops that the United States...has a hamartia. Why is that consensus crucial? Alcoholics Anonymous got it right: an open admission is a necessary first step to a solution. If America will make a comparable acknowledgement, it can begin to control the unconscious and autonomous complex presently deciding its destiny, instead of being controlled by it. Now, that would constitute a true independence day. For the time being, I will not waste my time or yours by offering a solution to a problem that is not acknowledged to be a problem.

That clue is more than a clue. It identifies in another way America´s hamartia, the unconscious, psychological complex constellated by wars. Thus, the answer to the second question also will solve our conundrum.

****I see no reason to be equally charitable with other bellicose escapades, notably Ronald Reagan´s invasion of Grenada in 1983. The two-day excursion pitted 7,000 American soldiers against 1,500 Grenadian troops and 700 Cuban construction crew workers. Whatever a war is, Grenada wasn´t it.*****A case study of psychic inflation in a milieu of pronounced illusions: "Russel Crowe, winner of the Academy Award for best actor in 2000 for his role in ´Gladiator,´ dedicated his Oscar to those who, like himself, had grown up in the working-class suburb of a big city and dreamed of winning such an award. ´To anybody who’s on the downside of advantage,´ he said, ´it’s possible.´ (Ricky Lyman, ´Spreading the Wealth at the Academy Awards,´ International Herald Tribune, March 27, 2001.) But anybody who has ever been to a movie knows that it is not possible for everyone to win an Oscar. To start with, as the movie credits show, to make a movie requires numerous professions and functions for which no Oscar is awarded. Compare the above Academy Award incident with the presentation of Danis Tanovic, the Bosnian director, of his film ´No Man’s Land´ at Cannes in 2001: ´I had a beautiful crew, professionally and humanly. Making a movie depends on 300 people. If you have one bad actor or the wrong person in charge of continuity, it can destroy your movie. So when you see my film in Cannes, it’s not about me, it’s about the 300 people behind me.´ (Joan Dupont, ´No Man’s Land: A Tale From Bosnia’s Trenches,´ International Herald Tribune, May 18, 2001. )"Excerpt from The Source of Terrorism: Middle Class Rebellion, p. 134.*****Fragment 119. http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Heraclitus.